‘Peter visited one place after another’ (Acts 9:32) |
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Written by BISHOP LEONARD P. BLAIR
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Saturday, 09 October 2010 00:00 |
It was with great interest and prayerful support that I followed the recent visit of Pope Benedict XVI to the United Kingdom.
Since the 1960s we have grown accustomed to papal trips throughout the world. Although Pope John Paul II is credited with making these trips an integral part of the papal ministry, it should not be forgotten that after the Second Vatican Council his predecessor Pope Paul VI made memorable trips to the Holy Land, Turkey, India, the Philippines and the United States, among other places.
 During the past 40 years we have also become accustomed to a warm and enthusiastic reception of the Holy Father, even by non-Catholics, wherever he goes. After all, who could find fault with a revered religious and spiritual leader who speaks of the importance of God, faith, universal moral values, justice, peace, compassion, charity, mutual respect and the dignity of the human person?
The world, however, is changing. Not the majority of the world, where religion and traditional moral values still largely prevail, but — irony of ironies — the very heartland of western Christianity. It is Europe and the Americas that are changing. A new mindset is emerging, very much at odds with the received truths upheld by the Christian faith. One has only to think of the ascendency of relativism and the debate about the definition of marriage.
In the United States we speak of “culture wars” as a metaphor for the growing conflict between those values considered traditional or conservative and those considered progressive or liberal. Interestingly, "culture war" made its way into the English language as a result of what happened in Germany from 1871 to 1878, when the German government waged what was called a Kulturkampf ("battle of cultures") against the influence of the Roman Catholic Church.
What is very significant about the pope’s recent visit, however, is that Benedict did not indulge in the rhetoric of “culture wars.” Instead, he issued a serene and respectful invitation to people of good will to consider the proper place of religious belief within the political process of a democracy, and by extension, within the formation of a nation’s culture.
Any attempt to govern a society by purely materialistic considerations and pragmatic solutions, without reference to moral truths, is dangerous and ultimately doomed to failure. As evidence of that point, the Holy Father cited the breakdown in the world’s financial system. More radically, we also know what happened in places like Nazi Germany.
What is it, the pope asked, that determines the moral principles underpinning the democratic process in a pluralistic society? Surely it cannot be a simple majority vote, as if “might makes right” when it comes to moral good and evil. If the moral principles underpinning the democratic process are themselves determined by nothing more firm than social consensus, then the fragility of the process becomes all too evident.
How then can society’s leaders find firm moral principles? The pope answered that question with an appeal to the authority of natural law, that is, the universal moral law given by God in the very act of creating human beings and open to being known by the light of human reason. What we know as the Ten Commandments correspond to the natural law. The pope pointed out that one of the British Parliament’s great historic achievements, the abolition of the slave trade, “was built upon firm ethical principles rooted in the natural law, and it has made a contribution to civilization of which this nation may be justly proud.”
Properly understood, in the words of the pope, “the role of religion in political debate is not so much to supply … norms still less to propose concrete political solutions … but rather to help purify and shed light upon the application of reason to the discovery of objective moral principles.” It is true that religion can be distorted by sectarianism and fundamentalism, but reason too can be distorted by ideology or a failure to respect the dignity of persons. The world needs both “the world of secular rationality and the world of religious belief.” It is a two-way street.
The pope warned of “the increasing marginalization of religion, particularly of Christianity, that is taking place in some quarters, even in nations which place a great emphasis on tolerance. There are those who would advocate that the voice of religion be silenced, or at least relegated to the purely private sphere. There are those who argue that the public celebration of festivals such as Christmas should be discouraged, in the questionable belief that it might somehow offend those of other religions or none. And there are those who argue — paradoxically with the intention of eliminating discrimination — that Christians in public roles should be required at times to act against their conscience. These are worrying signs of a failure to appreciate not only the rights of believers to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion, but also the legitimate role of religion in the public square.”
We live in a fallen world. St. Thomas More was condemned to death in the very hall in which Pope Benedict spoke to today’s political leaders. St. Thomas was martyred because he refused to accept Henry VIII in place of the pope as visible head of the church. Pope Benedict said this illustrates a problem that every political body must face: “the perennial question of the relationship between what is owed to Caesar and what is owed to God.”
I said earlier that we can no longer assume that a pope will be well received in a “culture war” world. However, it was very gratifying to see what happened in Great Britain. The British Daily Telegraph commented that “something unexpected is happening during the papal visit to this country … the British public is listening with curiosity and genuine respect to Pope Benedict XVI.” The paper rebuked angry protesters — and, indirectly, the media reports that have given those protesters so much attention:
“Pope Benedict's critics have underestimated him. They worked themselves into a state of indignation at the visit of a man about whom they knew only a few things — and most of these turn out to be wrong, on closer inspection. Anyone who thinks that Joseph Ratzinger is a former Nazi, or that he actively conspired to protect child abusers, has not done his or her homework.”
There is a lot of misjudging and underestimating of Pope Benedict in the United States too, a lot of neglected homework when it comes to the contribution that the Catholic Church can make and is making to our nation. In Pope Benedict’s trip to the United Kingdom there are lessons for us all.
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Last Updated on Saturday, 09 October 2010 00:00 |
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